Talbot said she wasn’t aware of anyone having seen the woman, who traveled a lot, in about six years.

“She was probably there for a couple of days, then she’d leave for a week, then she’d come back. Then she’d leave for a month and come back,” Talbot said.

McCabe says neighbors chalked up the woman’s absences to her returning to Germany for long periods of time.

Despite years without a living owner, the house was never broken into, he said.

Authorities told WXYZ that the house appears to have black mold inside it, and that detectives entered the building Thursday wearing hazardous material suits.

Another neighbor, Darryl Tillery, told the Detroit Free Press that mail never piled up at the houseand the lawn never grew out of order. McCabe said one of the neighbors cut the grass for years.

Cause of death undetermined

Police were dispatched to the house for a welfare check in 2007 after a neighbor reported not having seen the owner in a while. After seeing no signs of anything amiss, police went on their way, McCabe said.

Authorities are still waiting for a toxicology report, which will take four to six weeks, before determining the cause of death. The medical examiner found no signs of trauma to the body, McCabe said.

Dr. Bernardino Pacris, the county deputy medical examiner who conducted the autopsy, told the Detroit Free Press that the woman’s skin was still intact, but that the internal organs had decomposed.

Pacris told the newspaper that during the mummification process, skin develops a parchment-like consistency and leathery texture. Finding a body in such a condition is unusual, he said, but “once in a while, we see this.”

16 comments

Mike

6 years on welfare and never had to report to an office?? I am on disability (stroke patient, and dead brain tissue because of the stroke) and I have to report to a disability doctor every three years.

Cate S

REALLY ? authorities aren’t identifying the woman until they’ve informed her family?? I would say after 6 years of NOT talking to her, they probably dont really care that she has died. I don’t know how you can go 6 years without anyone noticing you were gone … how SAD!

amk

amy

Why was she even in the back seat?!? She prob has family out.of tge country or she prob dont have.any family. And sometimes if mail piles up the mail man will take the mail and send it back thats what they did with myod house.